no vegetables in the ground for me this season.

Our tomatoes are always late and onions pathetically small.

It's easier to go to the local Farmers Market and get them plump and early.

They also distrubute tokens for seniors which shaves a couple of bucks off the cost.

Just saying.

I don’t even bother planting any veg until june 1

1/2" rain yesterday. Slow and steady all day into last night.

So far, we're getting just enough rain to get by but not quite enough for my liking.

So, supplemental watering is still in place.

But if I go by Meteorological season, it's not spring anymore anyways. 🤣

Clark, the earliest things planted here, after potatoes are cabbage, peas, turnips, things that can take a nip or two.

This year, I see soybeans up already for over a week, which is a little risky in May.

Back in the day when I Farmed, I was told Farming is a gamble.

Kenny Rogers made a song to that effect 'The Gambler'. 😉

PS: No deer in the back yard so far this season. 🤞

PS2: I should be done with deer protection by now but I keep buying things so it never ends. 😅

What UBG said earlier about still having long-term drought here seems to appear here as the topsoil already looks not much better now than before the rain. The dry deep soil just sucked downward and away all the recent rain out of the topsoil.

After an April record of 10 inches of rain, May set a record low .36 inches of rain. Praying for a normal June.

tj

Beng, we went down to 45 f. recently, ridiculous when the solar angle of over 70 degrees and your altitude is like, sea level. It never ends this year.

Bill, no deer in your yard, so far?! They are here every day, year long, like herds of them, but still have a suburban rainforest. I just plant deadly or inedible stuff.

I've been adjusting my yard too, eliminating much of what the deer come for in the first place.

There's no easy answer, and I'm not, shall we say, as driven as some of you folks, that want only certain types of 'sought after' plants, although I've had a good run at it.

In fact, I'm far enough down the trail, I'm trying to make things less inviting to wildlife and not need winter protection.

So far, so good. :-)

From what I've noticed, deer will go after anything "new". Plant something small in the middle of unmowed lush grass and they will ignore the grass and eat the "new" thing.

Thought deer don’t even eat grass. They eat broadleaf mainly. Elk can eat grass though

Deer are classified as 'Browsers' while Elk 'Grazers'.

I haven't noticed signs of deer in my yard for over a year now but it's hard for me to be totally relaxed about them.

In winter, I continue to use 4ft. fence around my Korean maple because the only damage I've ever had, was early spring; deer came when the buds were swelling and nipped the branch tips. After the leaves unfurl, they don't bother it at all. Size matters and mine will be tall enough after this season so damage will be minimal in the future. 😉

"From what I've noticed, deer will go after anything "new"."

YES, very, very TRUE. I just planted inedible grasses, they did not eat them, they PULLED THEM OUT OF THE GROUND! Same with trees, they HIT THE NEW ONES WORST!!! No idea why.

No rain in the forecast.

As Ben said, the recent rain, as much as it was, just put off a disaster. The soil did absorb it - but so did trees! I noticed the leaves on my Cotinus 'Grace' expanded quite a bit in the past week.

But it's already getting dry again, fast, because soil moisture was so in deficit. I was talking to the owner of a nursery in Maryland and he said a nearby farmer with a backhoe recently dug down to 7 feet and the soil was bone dry all the way down. I can't remember a YOY dry spell like this, back to when I got into gardening around 1988. Even the drought in 2002 (IIRC) was more acutely severe, but it didn't span over 3 seasons like this one is about to. The early summers of 2010, 2011 and 2012 were very hot and dry, but big hurricanes or tropical storms restored soil moisture in each of those years. They are already predicting a lesser hurricane season - and remember recent forecasts for big seasons did not pan out!

Meanwhile...not something that anyone has brought up yet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xanHmQo5TSA

Time to pray for a hurricane lol?

L Clark, typically el ninos cause upper-air shear in the western Atlantic and suppress tropical storms. But tropical storm activity on the eastern Pacific off Mexico isn't affected.

UBG, yeah, 1988 is the driest year in my records. 2001 was very dry too, extending into 2002, but that year dryness broke around late August from a whole bunch of tropical activity moving north into the mid-Atlantic states.

' Time to pray for a hurricane lol? '

We almost do that here, Clark, but it's Thunderstorms instead, generally with severe attributes included.

This is what it looks lilke for Tonight. We're not in the 'Bullseye' which reduces the chances of it becoming severe (still can be a rough go of it) and they're forecasting ~1/2" of hard rain, not the slow soaking rains we should've had last spring. But we take what we get. ⛈️

New climate regime is either monsoon flooding or drought, just deal with it!

I picked up less than a tenth inch just before I finished watering after lunch. It came down hard enough, it drove me into the garage. It only lasted a minute or two followed by some light showers.

This is what future radar shows just before 10PM tonight: Storm heading east. 🤞🤞

In the end, we received 2/10ths last night so 3/10" counting the early afternoon shower.

As said earlier, a lot of hoopla about inches of rain, then the storm splits or diminishes as it arrives. But no wind, hail or other destructive events at all.

Glad I have a hose. 😏

Temps in mountain areas 6-3-26 morning. 41F here.

About 24F difference in 6 am temps at locations within a couple miles of each other -- ridgetop and adjacent deep valley.

Has been absolute summertime here, the last couple of weeks.

Lows in the high 50's to low 60's and mostly around mid 80's for highs.

A little warmer than normal for early June here, but everything's growing day and night, so we'll take it! 😉

Picked up 2/10" yesterday.

After a forecast of 1-1/2" earlier.

Keeps things from becoming 'dry-dry' at least and filled one of my rain barrels for supplementation.

More (0.58") rain forecast tonight.

edit: 0.36"

edit: 0.76" <rolleyes>

6-10-2026:

Well, a lot of high winds, and continuous rounds of loud thunder and not any hail that I could see but we did end up with 0.75" last night. 😄

I haven't seen a thunderstorm like this in quite a while. Widespread. ~4:00 AM

I'm glad you got some rain. Meanwhile, we're back into the pattern of the past 2 summers where forecasts for rain fizzle out just before they were supposed to materialize.

from this:

to this:

And btw I'm crazy in plenty of ways, but I'm not crazy about this. And another thing is the opposite state of affairs is so rare now - where a storm outperforms its forecast. In fact I was thinking back to my first first years in this neighborhood, one of the only people who was particularly welcoming to me was a sweet old lady next door...now deceased. She kept a rain gauge and she'd sometimes see me in the garden and say something like "can you believe we got 3 inches? They had only forecast 1". etc. etc.

Ugh, pretty much the same here, although we have received a couple/few tenths, a couple of times so far this spring, but nothing to soak us up good for the coming hot dry summer. And it's been so hot! Nearly 90 again yesterday and for late May and early June, those kinds of temperatures are just plain crazy.

On the bright side, getting any appreciable rain, when you could really use it is good and it is more normal here to have spells that are on the dry side.

The way our weather patterns form, one or two TS's, at the right times makes all the difference.

I can remember several 'moisture sufficient' seasons since I moved up here 50 years ago, and a majority that were marginal and several downright drought.

When I lived down in Mpls. I remember hard, soaking rains during summertime and when people would say, boy, it's getting dry, I would think, it just rained 3" last week! 🤣

Iit did rain more regularly down there.

The soil there was better also, than I have now bc landscapers back then would bring in some of the nicest black loam you could imagine and lay down a good foot of that around newly built housing/yards. Ours was nice black loam that grew maples like instant tree.

I remember Dad telling me there was a 'hardpan' layer a few feet down, so, I would think that helped retain moisture by not letting water drain down like a sieve.

Well, a tenth and a half more rain AND whatever this would amount to once melted, another tenth?

The hail damage was'nt as bad as it could've been.

We're going to need new siding on the west side of the house but with hailstones that large (size between a tennis ball and golf ball), it's a wonder that more things were'nt destroyed.

This pot was hit from the inside and it blew right through, soil and all (missed the plants).

A heavy plastic lawn chair was no match either.

The damage to yard trees amounted to many leafy branches, off mature trees laying all around the yard. I had to clip a few small branches that were broken and 'hanging' on the Sugar Maple.

The only damage to my newer plantings were to the Korean maple missing a bark patch (there may be more).

And the main leader of the Meyeri spruce (it didn't appear to break).

The insurance adjuster will make an appearance. We never, I mean never have any hail big enough to do this much damage, this far North. And my deductable on hail damage will be the biggest hit.

But at least it wasn't another Tornado. 😒

Wow, pretty bad hailstorm. I cringe when hail starts to fall here and fear damage, but your storm was much worse.

First time in my life I've ever experience hail this size.

The main leader on the Norway spruce broke off but there's another right next to it.

Everything has some damage but nothing that's a huge setback. 😏

PS:

After raking up a big tote full of leafy branches, leaves and conifers new growth, I could look up at the trees and couldn't really tell where they came from. Much cooler temperature for the next week, even one 60d day and 46 at night. That will be good because of all the plants I chose to plant here because they like cooler climates, and we haven't had that for over a month!

Hail is a actually a rather rare phenomenon here (NJ/Coastal/Zone 7a/b), in over 60 years, I only vividly remember one storm with mothball sized hail, they, like tornadoes, they are nature's gift to the heartland it seems. Was reading recently, that hail is expected to get even bigger where it does occur, you guessed it, Climate Change. After a relatively, coolish Spring, it is now Summer, mid 90's. Drought seems to be looming on the NJ horizon, especially now for south and central NJ. And with a potent El Niño in play, East Coast hurricanes will not be favored, and they tend to keep things MOIST!

P.S., As I get older, San Diego is looking better and better!

Latest Drought Monitor.Drought Monitor

wow, bill, that’s some high plains worthy hail. Here you can pretty much guarantee you’ll get a new roof from insurance y 10-15 years.

LC, yeah, there were worse areas in other parts of town. We'll be getting a new roof and new siding.

41 & LC and everyone. 😄

If I count the 3/4" of rain and the shower with the hail (hail lasted about a minute), I'm estimating we received a full inch of moisture. That's great and will keep us limping along for another week ;-).

And if I include the 100 gallons of rain stored in the barrels (which I use in between rains for my fertilizer program), things have been growing well (the overflow hose on the last barrel ran long enough to deep water the flower bed, under the garage eaves, which is generally very dry there).

The hail is the first we've had here for several years, maybe 6 years now.

The largest of the stones, this time, amounted to about 10% of the total hail stones, with every other stone size included, from pea sized all the way up to 'bigger than a golf ball' (100% of the larger ones would've been a complete catastrophe, even 50%).

My biggest 'oh no' was the Weeping white spruce. I had near 10" of new growth on the main leader already and still going strong. That leader has now been reduced to about 6". But I suppose being located right under the roof edge of the shed, it directed a larger volume of hail onto it.

Still looks good and is making a nice 'skirt' for such a young age. 😉

6-13-26:

Back to NW winds for the next several days and much cooler (70's) for highs (63 high for today, 45 low tonight). Plenty of sun.

Got my first close up look at a cone off my Balsam fir the hail knocked off.

The chicken wire surrounds that were still on some of my plants, actually protected them from the hail. Some of the CW had deep depressions, where a larger stone hit into it but held its ground.

I had just placed a piece of hardware cloth on top of the new Canaan fir, thinking a deer 'might' nip it. Turns out it protected the plant from the hail entirely.

Just a few more reports on hail damage.

The Aesculus glabra lost several leaves and got shredded on a couple/three but it was semi-protected by the sunshade (even though the sunshade was bent over 35d in supposedly up to 80mph winds for this area).

I'm glad it was nearing the end of it's 'Growth Spurt' for the season, gaining upwards of 32' with the top end starting to harden off for now.

For some reason, the Tannenbaum didn't show any, maybe some slight damage.

All but one little branch at the bottom, appears to have at least a few new needles expanding, with 2" growth at the top and various lengths of new growth on different branches, so at least my gamble on this tree has played out and it looks like it will be a nice addition to that part of the yard.

Again, almost everything showed at least some damage with lots of conifer branch tips on the ground.

The Picea meyeri that took a hit on the main leader, bent but did not break.

The new growth equals what it did last season, but I can see terminal buds forming which means it might stretch up a little more, then lignify into a sturdier stem. 🤞

The octopus tree (jack pine) that grows like this without any supplimental fertilizer or water, had numerous candles laying on the ground but it was hard to tell where they came from.

It's a one tree wind break. 😄

Black hills spruce fared well and will continue to grow unabaded.

Serbian spruce were protected by 3 ft CW. That kept all the 'Big Ones' off them.

This one was put in earlier this spring and is establishing itself with new growth.

Its brother has been in the ground since early summer, last season and has reponded well to the hot weather and rain + my very, very mild fertilizer applications.

The norway spruce had it new growth thinned out and it already had some frozed buds in the first place. The main leader broke off in the hail but another close by, is being trained up.

The Hemlocks lost several tiny branch tips but you can hardly notice it,

The J. Chinensis with the slaughtered roots from last year is making a comeback.

Can you tell which is the 'Real' main leader?

Have fun. That's the whole point. 😉

I'm seeing that evergreens w/needles are more resistant than fleshy-leaved hardwoods in their resistance to hail damage. Kinda makes sense as evergreen leaves typically have to be durable enough to last more than just one growing season.

One year there was a hailstorm here (not as bad as yours) that punched holes thru (shredded-off some too) most of my catalpa's big leaves, but didn't kill the leaves.

If the A. glabra would'nt have had a sun shade, I had recently added, it would've been shredded.

The new Diervilla only had one leaf, half missing and held it's ground in hurricane force winds.

I've seen cornfields completely shredded in the past, a couple of times.

The upside is hail storms generally cover small areas. This one stayed basically inside the city limits, more notherly sections. Although there could've been other areas, bc these storms can be scattered around on the same night and this was a big system.

The latest drought monitor shows widespread drought in the US west. Since air-flow is generally west-to-east, that means hot-dry weather will be common there and also to the east from the air-flow. Not good.

After not having rain with windy, sunny weather, I went around with my high-volume shower head on the hose and gave most of my smaller, moisture loving plants water, according to my assessment of need.

Then last night, those scattered rain showers, over what looked like the entire 5 state area, deposited 1/4" nice & slow to add to that.

The mid to low 70's for high temperatures have helped with the heat stress and the plants are showing it. What was once the dormant main leader bud, on the nordmann, has decided to at least do something this season but it will be a little behind.

Astronomical spring is nearing its end, but it's looking more normal, weatherwise for this area, albeit precipitation is still on the sparse side.

After predictions of around a tenth or two, I found 9/10" in the rain gauge this morning.

I've always said that JIT rains are the best here, because our soil doesn't have much reserve capacity and the top layer dries out so quickly.

When it rains, it's like a day off, bc generally I spend my spare time irrigating.

Good rain for you, Bill.

44F this morning, but tomatoes are finally growing fast.

Just looking at the updated drought monitor, no bueno para NJ. Seems like Extreme drought in the southernmost counties of Cape May, then much of the state in Severe drought. I am in the borderline Moderate/Severe drought zone, but now feel that it will be moving north through the state rapidly.

With me living in a droughty area, I feel your pain 41.

It's raining again here this morning, just showers with a quarter inch predicted, but I've suspended my fertilizer program on my newer trees, out of concern of keeping things too wet and we all know what can happen then. 😉

Been highs in the mid 60's but they're talking 70's by tomorrow, with rain again Tuesday.

Then possibly a rainy spell the week after that. Of course, sometimes they lie. 🤣

Rain barrels are full and the flower bed under the overhang has been well watered from the overflow.

My grass will be pretty long if it doesn't dry out by sometime tomorrow.

I managed to get the weed whipping done yesterday.

The hail damage has remained minimal, as I'm further accessing everything.

Unless the chips off the Korean maple bark lets in a disease or something like that.

Adjusters and contractors have been out, so we got the ball rolling on house repairs.

This whole part of town has contactor signs in their front yards, you can see as you drive down the street.

After a few Hail and tornado warnings this afternoon, we ended up with 0.2" total and a lot of wind.

All scattered TS's. ⛈️

Oh well, better than a hot dry day. ☔

Bill, define "HOT" for you.

P.S., Yeah, definitely feel like we are moving into drought, last few days, very dry, sunny, low humidity and weirdly WINDY.

P.S., 2, Time to start a Summer 2026 Weather posting!

Yes, tommoro is not spring anymore! 😄

Mid 80's to mid 90's is hot, 100's are few and far between, most times absent during summer.

The big difference it whether or not we get RAIN. Dry hot, no good, moist hot, we'll take it!

We get over 15-1/2 hours of Sun this time of year and it can stay 80's all night but that's rare.

People travel hundreds of miles to spend time in northern MN during the summer, because it's some of the coolest summer weather in the CONUS (and the fishing and thousands of lakes and resorts too).

Bill, one and maybe only good thing about being in a frost-hollow like me is that even during summer hot spells, the morning temps are almost never above 65F, often lower. Mornings of upper 40s here in late July aren't all that uncommon if the dew-point is very low.

Absolutely,

Cool nights will give certain plants a reprieve after a long hot day, so they tolerate a following hot day better in that sense.

I've notice that with some of my conifers, and for that matter, trees like my Korean maple, they somehow look better in the morning, than they do late afternoon.

46d here last night. Low to mid 50's lows and low to mid 70's for highs this next week.

Warm enough for things to grow, so it seems. ;-)

I live within the Metro NJ/NYC heat island, if you drive up from southernmost NJ in the summer, where nights in the Pinebarrens can be coolish (due to sandy soils), into the Northeast corredor, it's a bit of a shock, as temps may not fall below 75-80 F at night and humidity is high. Blame all the articifial sources of heating, concrete, air conditioners, higher local C02 levels, fewer green spaces..., etc. Since 86 F is the average high, I would say above 92 is hot. If the ground stays this dry moving into Summer, expect some records to be broken, even without the forecast for an especially hot forcast for the Northeast..., but those long-range forecasts are dubious at best. Happy SUMMER!

Happy summer!

I'll let you easterners start the Summer 2026 thread.

I'm not as focused on weather events, records, causes and scientific analogies like some of you. I'll just sit back, enjoy summer and maybe add a report or two when something worth reporting happens, ;-)

Thanks!